Truth breathed by cheerfulness.
Once in her reading she came upon the story of the scholar who left Oxford and the paths of learning to follow the ways of the wandering gypsies in order that he might learn the natural wisdom they had won. "Ah," she said to herself, "some day when I am free to live my life in my own way I shall leave my books and go out among the Indians. Our country should know what its first children saw and thought and felt. I shall try to see with their eyes and hear with their ears for a while and I shall discover, in that way, perhaps, a new world—one that will be lost forever when the Red Men are made to adopt all the tricks and manners of civilized life."
The time came when she found herself free to realize this dream.
"You don't mean to say you are really going to live with the Indians?" her friends exclaimed.
"How else can I know them?" she replied quietly.
"But to give up every necessary comfort!"
"There is something perhaps better than just making sure that we are always quite comfortable," said Miss Fletcher. "Of course, I shall miss easy chairs and cozy chats, and all the lectures, concerts, latest books, and daily papers, but I'm glad to find out that all these nice things are not really so necessary that they can keep me from doing a bit of work that is really worth while, and which, perhaps, needs just what I can bring to it."
At this time Miss Fletcher's earnest, thoughtful studies of what books and museums could teach about the early history of America and the interesting time before history, had given her a recognized place among the foremost scholars of archeology—the science that reads the story of the forgotten past through the relics that time has spared.
"Many people can be found to study the things about the Indians which can be collected and put in museums," said Miss Fletcher, "but there is need of a patient, sympathetic study of the people themselves."
In order to make this study, she spent not only months but years among the Dakota and Omaha Indians. From a wigwam made of buffalo skins she watched the play of the children and the life of the people and listened to their songs and stories.